Various devices are presently available for identifying fault conditions in a fuel-gas fired burner system. For example, the controllers for such systems might include a plurality of light emitting diodes, which might be mounted on a printed circuit board located within a controller or on a control panel positioned adjacent to or located remotely from the controller. If a fault condition occurs resulting from the improper operation of one of the system components, a light emitting diode is illuminated, thus indicating to the appliance owner or the service man that a component within the system is not operating properly. This approach can prove to be dangerous since it can encourage the appliance owner to attempt to service the system himself. Since most appliance owners are inexperienced with respect to the operation of fuel-gas fired burner systems, such appliance owners, in an attempt to correct a fault condition, might electrically and/or mechanically bypass a safety device within the system, thus creating a very dangerous condition.
Other fault indicating approaches utilize terminals or "read-outs" on a control panel permitting a service man to attach diagnostic equipment to same to determine the cause of the fault condition. An inherent disadvantage of this latter approach is that the fault conditions are typically pre-selected by the controller manufacturer and cannot be "customized" for a specific application. In addition, physical connections must be made by the service man to the terminals or "read-outs" on the controller in order to identify the fault conditions.
In view of the foregoing disadvantages associated with the prior art approaches to identifying fault conditions within a fuel-gas fired burner system, it has become desirable to develop a system having fault indicating capabilities and comprising a controller which produces a plurality of fault indicating outputs from a single light emitting diode, each output indicative of a specific fault condition, and a "reading" device which deciphers each output and provides a visual "read-out" identifying the specific fault condition.